16 quotes found
"For twenty-five years you Flemings have been misunderstood, oppressed and humiliated', For 25 years the Flemings were addressed in a foreign language, sentenced and tried, for 25 years they had to do with French money, a French court, a French army and a French administration. For twenty-five years you have been strangers in your own land."
"In Flanders fields the poppies blow, Between the crosses, row on row, That mark our place; and in the sky The larks, still bravely singing, fly Scarce heard amid the guns below. We are the Dead. Short days ago We lived, felt dawn, saw sunset glow, Loved, and were loved, and now we lie In Flanders fields. Take up our quarrel with the foe: To you from failing hands we throw The torch; be yours to hold it high. If ye break faith with us who die We shall not sleep, though poppies grow, In Flanders fields."
"Flanders is a land of cathedrals and belfries, not mosques and minarets. The Flemish identity is linked to democracy and Islam clashes with our idea of a democracy."
"The Flemish language is wonderfully sweet for those who do not violate it."
"You will wrestle the holy battle with us for the despised mother tongue, convinced that we, fighting for the mother tongue, also fight for our Religion, for our Fatherland, and for our own self-existence!"
"With the tongue and the pen for the Catholic faith, for the Flemish language and for the Fatherland."
"Everything for Flanders, Flanders for Christ."
"The Flemish, well they are big children."
"There is a kingdom on earth where the Walloon willfully lord it over, and deal with 'the Flemish race' 'as if it had been conquered'."
"And so, by the disposition of God who orders all things, the art of war, the flower of knighthood, with horses and chargers of the finest, fell before weavers, fullers and the common folk and foot soldiers of Flanders, albeit strong, manly, well armed, courageous and under expert leaders. The beauty and strength of that great [French] army was turned into a dung-pit, and the [glory] of the French made dung and worms."
"I thought about it carefully and I remained convinced that there is no place in Belgium that it could be more desirable for me to represent than Antwerp. ... I have always been imbued with the conviction that matters which particularly affect the prosperity of Antwerp should have a large part in the care of the government. Belgium had its era of commercial activity, because at that time it had ready-made means of selling the products of its manufactures. I think that the efforts of the government must tend to restore life to maritime trade, to multiply the means of exchange with overseas countries, to replace the colonial outlets which we have lost, to facilitate commercial relations with a liberal legislation."
"I don't want a Muslim as mayor of Antwerp. But I'm afraid that will happen sooner or later."
"While in 1960 barely 7% of the Antwerp population had an immigration background, in 2021 this has evolved to 59.7% of which the vast majority has a non-European background: 39.6% of Antwerp residents are of non-European descent. Knowing that in 2020 49.4% of the mothers of newborns were of non-European nationality, the bill was quickly settled. In a maximum of 20 years Antwerp will have a majority of residents of non-European descent, the majority of whom will be Muslims. The population is moving at a rapid pace. The flexible Belgian nationality legislation has become a kind of “Fast Belgian factory”. Foreigners disappear from the statistics and officially become Belgians, but of course ensure the further multiculturalization of Antwerp. Along with the ethnic transition, a cultural shift is also taking place, with all its consequences. The native Flemings and their culture and way of life threaten to become a minority in the long run, ripe for the reserve…"
"We are exhausted in Antwerp and have endured so much that this war seems without purpose.. ..[and that it seemed] strange that Spain, which provides so little for the needs of this country... has an abundance of means to wage an offensive war elsewhere."
"Thanks to the care of the Belgian military authorities, the volunteers returned to their homeland, we were able to find asylum in the barracks in Antwerp."
"A faithless wife brings ruin to the state."